Tag: iDisk

We’ve submitted the iPad version of iSMEStorage to the Apple App Store. We don’t want to say too much about this until its approved but you can it really does add something to the iPad as you can have up to 10 storage clouds in the palm of your hand. As soon as its approved we will publish a fully featured post, but in the meantime there are some images below to whet your appetite !

For many of use in the office using Mac’s we’ve yearned for some tighter integration with SMEStorage and the Mac. You can choose to use the Windows explorer via Crossover or WINE with the Mac and it works nicely, and you can also use the Firefox plug-in which also works really well, but having OS level integration is always nice.

Snow Leopard has enhanced the integration of the automator services into the OS which makes it much easier to provide contextual functionality.

Using this method there is now available an add-in for users of SMEStorage to be able to upload their files directly from the Mac to their chosen cloud of choice (and we now support over 10 storage clouds), and after the file has been uploaded a unique link for the file will be copied to the clipboard.

Similar to the WordPress plug-in we released that enables you to share files stored on various cloud files, we have also now done a similar plug-in for Joomla. The plug-in will enable you to share your cloud files on your Joomla site.

How does this work ? SMEStorage provides a gateway in which we sync your file meta-data but all files continue to reside on your storage platform. In this way we are able to offer value added services and clients to your existing storage provider, and provide a single cloud file system which enables you to manage all you files in one file tree.

One of the many value added services we provide is the ability to share files. There are many ways to do this, including RSS, email, Twitter, URL with Private contacts etc, and the Joomla plug-in is now another way. Also note that files that have been made public, and can therefore be shared on Joomla, can still be encrypted, so you can have private files publically available that you can choose ony to share with your userbase.

To get started, download and install the plug-in, and then register for an account on SMEStorage. Select the account that matches your cloud provider. In the process of setting your account up you will do a file meta-data sync and your files will then be available in the Cloud File Manager. From the File manager you can choose to make the file public. This post steps through how to do just that. Once the file is public you can choose to make it visibile on your Joomla site.

If you want to encrypt your files then upload them via SMEStorage to your cloud provider of choice and choose encryption at the point of upload. Don’t worry if your underlhying cloud provider does not support encryption it does not need to. Remember your password for the file though as we don’t keep it ! Once the file is uploaded to your cloud provider via the SMEStorage cloud gateway you can make it public and it will be available just like any other file.

During a lightening talk at London CloudCamp we talked about the need for a multi-cloud storage API (slides below). We then presented the options currently available, and of course the SMEStorage multi-cloud API is one of several. We do believe we bring some nice things to the table with out API which include:

– REST based providing an SPI to multiple clouds
– Provides value added services over and above just upload/dowload, and file system view. There are too many to list, but these include file encryption, Email backup, ETL from one cloud to another cloud, content filtering, faxing and much, much more
– Ability to provide a single view of disparate data in different clouds – a cloud data unification within a single file system view.

If you are a developer take the time to check out the API and let us know how we can do more to help and what features you are looking for.

As part of some new changes on the SMEStorage web platform (more of those in the next post) we have introduced contacts as data that you can back up to the cloud platforms we support.

In the SMEStorage explorer bar you will now see a Contact root Node:

When you click on this node you will see two new icons in your SMEStorage explorer Bar:

The first icon gives you the ability to backup contacts from over 50 email and social sites that provide contacts:

Once your contacts are imported (and you can back them up to any cloud that we support (which includes Amazon S3, Mosso Cloud Files, Box.net, Gmail-as-a-Cloud, Email-as-a-Cloud, FTP-as-a-Cloud, MobileMe, and any WebDav enabled cloud) they are stored as VCard files, and as they are treated as files you can mark them as favourites, share them over email, or Twitter etc.

You can also edit each contact and add extra information or more fields:

Once your contacts are imported you can create contact groups and sub groups and organise your contacts. All your contacts and contact groups are integrated into the site so if you want to share files over email or from business groups when you start typing the first letters your contacts will popup for your to insert.

All our client tools are developed using the SMEStorage Multi-Cloud API. It has been used to develop our iphone web client, Windows Tooling, Firefox plug-in, iGoogle Widget, Facebook Widget and more. It provides an abstraction against several storage clouds and features:

– File like system for manipulation
– Services, such as Email Backup, Send to Twitter, Create Business Collaboration group, email share, and many more

The API manual can be downloaded from Google Code and it is our intention to keep providing code examples. Currently on the site there is a .Net code example for creating a MS Office toolbar plug-iin which will work against all the clouds SMEStorage support. We will follow this soon with PHP examples and XCode / Cocoa examples.